Stuff and Stuff: Part III

Friday, August 25, 2017

Today was a day of diligence. I cleaned the Nubby Buddha and managed to change ALL their litter boxes, plus the inside litter boxes, and bird cages, just in time for the garbage pickup. I built up the rocks around the little gold fish pond with the hope that the baby fishes won't get washed away by the impending flood. I looked after the stray momma cat and her three kittens whom I relocated from the back porch to the shed. I went out to Home Depot for night lights and rubber gloves. Went to Walmart for wine, nicorette, and canned cat food. I talked to both Mom and Gordy today. Harvey the Hurricane is expected to make landfall close to Corpus Christi. Gordy's Mom and Sister live there. They seem to be prepared. John Michael texted me tonight to see if we were okay and ready for the storm. I received a text from Carol, who is the new TA for Java @ UH. She's just lovely. She said a few people had dropped by to ask about me. One of them is a professor who is such a nice fellow.

Tonight, I watched the movie "The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks." It was weird because I had just started reading the book and the movie popped up on Hulu. It's a good movie, sad, and moving.

As I was vacuuming the living room @ 1:00am tonight I had to laugh at myself. Vacuuming before a major storm is just like me douching before going to the hospital to give birth to my first child because I was afraid what the docs might think of my unkempt kootchie...my dumbassary.

Friday, August 18, 2017

Gordy and I were talking tonight after the 3rd Defenders show. We were talking about Leon Redbone's version of "Shine on Harvest Moon" and that somehow led to me admitting that Neil Diamond is one of my favorite male vocalists...and that led to my admitting that as a young girl, getting to see Jonathan Livingston Seagull in the movie theatre was transformative for me. You know, that scene where Jonathan flies higher than all the other birds. Yes!!!! Take that, unbelievers and assholes!

So, today I made a batch of black beans using the leftover drippings from last night's carnitas. I'm not going to lie, the aquafaba, the bean juice, whatever it is called was freaking fabulous! However, I totally messed up the heavenly bean nectar by tossing a couple of smoked pork necks that I had purchased from the grocery. I wanted to add a little meat to the mix and didn't realize HOW MUCH SALT (yes, screaming) was in them. Oh geez! Don't get me wrong, I am no pussy when it comes to the indiscriminate use of salt. Those salty pork necks turned my best beans ever into the Dead Sea of Legumes. No manner of kale, carrot, nor potato could rid my prize-winning black beans of the overwhelming salinity that took over. *sigh*

Now on to drowning my sorrow in copious amounts of cheap Woodbridge Sauvignon Blanc and binge-watching the new Netflix series "Defenders" while farting like a mule...assuming mules fart a lot.

Gordy has been playing his guitar all night. He is really getting good!

My Dad had some kind of crazy 5 hour surgery to remove cancer from his lip. All I know right now is that they took away so much tissue that they had to reconstruct his lip from the inside of his mouth. As much as I would like to have called him just to say "I love you," I couldn't bare the thought of him struggling with pain just to talk to me. So I texted instead. He responded. He always refers to himself as "Pops." One time, Mom eluded to her distaste for him calling himself "Pops." She said that it implied a closer sense of familiarity and kinship than "Dad" does. I don't get that at all. To me, "Pops" would be something I would expect to hear in a NY Italian gangster movie. Anyway, after Mom's comment, it makes me wonder if "Pop" is Dad's way of conveying a closeness.

The pic of the carnitas was taken prior to 2.5 hours of simmering followed by 30 minutes of roasting and shredding @10 minute intervals of basting in the juices. PLEASE, let me tell you that this shit was good, dayum good. The best I have ever eaten.

Yesterday, my Dad had some kind of lip surgery to cut out skin cancer. I don't know how it went. He told me he would call after the procedure and let me know how it was going, but he didn't. I did not want to bother him with calling especially if he was having a difficult time. I text messaged him early this evening (no response) maybe I will try to call him tomorrow.

I went to the new HEB in the back of Kingwood tonight. That is one helluva huge and sprawling grocery store. I tell you that we fat lazy 'mericans are a lucky bunch to have such a variety of food available at our fingertips. That store is a cornucopia. I felt inspired, yet frustrated as I had to keep running back to the produce section for accompaniments to meal ideas. I'm ashamed of my "first world" problems. None the less, I got stuff to make carnitas, veggie kraut, Thai chicken in coconut soup, and more!

I'm going to use the left over broth from the carnitas to make a new batch of black beans tomorrow. I know they will be good!

Wednesday, August 09, 2017

One reason this recipe caught my eye is because the quiche is baked in a cast iron skillet. At a glance one might assume it is a one skillet meal kind of gig... but actually, I dirtied a shit ton of dishes.

Tuesday, August 08, 2017

This morning I woke up late after having stayed up until 3am with Gordy who was on work conference calls with participants from all over the world.

For breakfast I fried up potatoes with garlic and onion in ghee, cooked a couple links of andouille sausage, sauteed some kale, and fried eggs sunny side up. Gordy loved it! I have to say it was surprisingly satisfying in that I felt full well before I had finished my food. I wonder if cooking with ghee has anything to do with my feelings of fullness?

Our local grocer has started stocking a brand of ghee called "4th & Heart." It's a little pricy for sure, but I was intrigued by the fact that it is made from grass-fed cows, and it is salted with Himalayan salt. Most of the ghee I have seen is unsalted and in the past I did not care for the taste or smell of it so much. This stuff is good! Also, it does not require refrigeration. I looked on Amazon's website and it can be purchased through them at about $3-4 less a jar, if you subscribe to regular deliveries.

I started a batch of navy beans that I had soaked overnight. I always forget how white beans seem to cook faster than the darker beans so I ended up scooping out most of the beans and letting the smoked pork necks to cook down more. I used bone broth and regular chicken broth for the bean liquid, added about 10 cloves of garlic, fresh parsley, and Mexican oregano. I felt like the broth was a little too salty so ended up adding a potato to the pot hoping that it would soak up some of the salt. Then about 30 minutes before serving I added a bunch of chopped purple kale to the slow simmering pot. Overall, the beans taste good.

The Greek-style bell pepper salad is very good. I LOVE the dressing. The salad is a mix of chopped up cucumber, one each of all colors of bell pepper, pitted Kalamata olives, fresh parsley, green onion, and cubes of feta cheese. The dressing is a mix of olive oil, white wine vinegar, Sumac, Za'atar, minced garlic, pink Himalayan salt, and pepper. This dressing tastes very much like the dressing on Niko Niko's Greek salads.

As for TV last night, we started watching a comedy zombie series on Netflix called "The Santa Clarita Diet." It's kind of cute.

One thing that occurred to me as I learned about this philosophy is how much nicer a place the world might be if we all believed that life of all forms is a part of a single unified, or integrated soul.

Wednesday, August 02, 2017

It has been raining on and off all day. There's been no sunshine at all so the temperature has dropped to a slightly less intolerable level of heat. I've got a batch of zucchini muffins baking in the oven right now and the house is smelling loved. Gordy and I rarely eat sweets, so I rarely-if-ever bake sweet things. Last week, I couldn't bring myself to throw away overripe bananas and decided, what the hell, make banana muffins. Turns out Gordy REALLY likes having muffins in the morning. So I am making a fresh batch today to replenish our muffin stash.

The only thing I changed with the recipe was adding some hemp seed and the zest of 1/2 lemon to brighten them a little.

As for dinner: baked potatoes loaded with Korean BBQ and all the fixings. The Korean BBQ is a cheater dish, a prepared thing we got from Costco.

On another note, the little stray black cat (I call her "Deuce," as in someone dropped a deuce on me) that has been hanging around the house lately, revealed her not-so-precious brood of five to me during today's rain storms...not cool, Deuce. I really don't think I can take any more of this cat problem that used to be my home and my life. Deuce had apparently moved her crew to higher ground within the open cockpit of the forgotten dreams sailboat doomed to dry dock in the driveway. The problem with Deuce's logic is that the cockpit tends to drain much slower than it fills during a heavy rain. I heard kittens crying and followed it until I located the five very wet and upset kittens. It is no wonder that my usual crew of spayed/neutered free range ferals were not wanting to hang around the house lately. They are as fond of kittens as I am.

I found another adult fairy tale to watch tonight. It's called "Tale of Tales."